Lawro’s Gentle Probing
By Mark Daniell
10/06/2012
Ah a media storm, who needs flooding when you’ve got a good old fashioned Media Storm? In fairness you can see where the tabloids are coming from. With a brand new manager and expectations damper than whatever comes up when you google “damper than a …”, who are they going to vilify? But then you remember that the words ‘footballing reasons’ are, like all words in the tabloids’ eyes, open to interpretation. You see, to some people ‘footballing reasons’ sounds like ‘footballing reasons’, but to others, it could sound like ‘it’s cos he’s black’. Sol Campbell will return all 73 of his England caps if, after vigourously fanning the media firestorm, he subsequently discovers there was any racial motivation behind Rio’s omission. Which is another way of saying ‘I currently know of nothing that supports my opinion’. In fact Gabby Logan got Roy in an interview yesterday and finally coaxed the reasoning out of him. Apparently he needed an understudy for right back, and Rio is neither a right back, nor an understudy. Disappointingly for all those capless orphans, he notably failed to tack on that he felt Rio was a sambo and that he had enough of those in defence.
The concept of race determining selection in football is ridiculous anyway. As a rule international sport is segregationist. Can Ryan Giggs play for England? No. Is it cos I is Welsh? Yes. Isn’t that racist? Yes. When Lawro had a dig at Podolski for being Polish and yet playing for Germany, he was fundamentally criticising Podolski’s lack of support for a segregationist tradition (which was a bit rich considering his own Irish footballing pedigree). The fact is you can’t simply blame racism because someone isn’t selected. Which is not of course to say that racism doesn’t exist in football, just look at the fans in Poland and the Ukraine, or the ITV commentary team. Frankly, the likes of Sol and the tabloid press should refrain a little from crying wolf just to create a few headlines while the real thing goes unpunished in front of our very eyes.
Anyway, back to footballing reasons. I wasn’t going to write any of this. The World Cup is two years behind us and I wasn’t sure my audience had felt the tournament particularly enriched by my witty and always poignant commentary. One person even went so far as request their email be removed from the mailing list. So I duly removed it from the mailing list and popped it onto the mailing list of one of Asia’s larger viagra sales teams. But then last week another person asked if I was going to be writing some witty and always poignant commentary on the Euros. So I mulled, and I ummed, and before I could make up my mind Lawro and Mowbray took the decision out of my hands: half an hour into the Germany Portugal game Mowbray referred to the German team as ‘the Mannshaft’. Was he demonstrating diligent cultural research? Almost certainly. Was he also teeing up Lawro to dub their opening gambit ‘a bit of gentle probing’? You bet. Welcome back boys.
Lately I can’t help but feel that everyone at the BBC punditry camp is so in fear for their job that they daren’t say anything that isn’t in the script. Their mouths go through the motions but their souls are dying inside. Alan Hansen visibly flinches when he hears himself saying ‘Taim n taim agin” and Gary’s one-liners have withered to snarky remarks about the autocue writers. In that atmosphere, to hear Lawro repeatedly call the German coach Yerghee-lure begins to sound a bit rebellious, and I applaud any effort to subvert the crushing BBC template, even if it should unwittingly pull back the covers on the Lawro love-making technique.
The only one who is revelling in the stench of fear is Shearer (who looks increasingly like a happy Bruce Willis). With everyone stifled, big Al no longer stands out for having the wit and insight of a bit of two by four.
Impressively, in order to stick to the prescribed narrative of a creative Germany and a negative Portugal, Gary, Harry (significantly subtitled with more than 1250 games as manager of English clubs), Clarence et Al had to ignore defending, the Group of Death and the fact that Germany are joint favourites for the title. They ignored that Portugal had successfully limited the Mannshaft to ineffective crosses and shots from range for the whole of the first half and that it was a deflected cross that led to the only goal. Meanwhile, Portugal hit the bar twice, forced two last-gasp blocks on the line and matched them on shots and possession. Had it ended 0-0, 1-1, or even 1-0 to Portugal, it wouldn’t have been a surprise. But the script had been written, and our boys just read out the lines.
Nonetheless, it was a good result for the Germans, who face the Dutch next in the greatest derby in world football. The Dutch may be on thin ice but they remain my tip for the tournament, they were unlucky against Denmark and if they create as many chances and have one or two refereeing calls go their way for a change, they should successfully keep the gentle probing of the Mannshaft out of their Netherlands.